Swimming to Paris

[kerouac2]

It has been determined over the past few years that the Canal Saint Martin and the Canal de l'Ourcq are not nearly as filthy as people automatically assumed that they were. I don't know how often they had been analysing the water, but it became evident last year particularly that it was necessary to know if there was a toxic risk. Why I say "last year particularly" is because many people had begun to swim without authorisation on hot days in the Bassin de la Villette, which is the wide basin that connects the Canal Saint Martin and the Canal de l'Ourcq.  Frankly, it must be admitted that most of these swimmers did not appear to be "ethnic French."  They looked like they came from the countries that a lot of us visit where we see childen frolicking in the water next to sewer pipes or other areas of toxic waste.

The analyses were surprising.  The bacterial count is 90% lower than the limit for allowing swimming in a waterway.  This of course does not mean that the water is "clean."  It can still contain a lot of muck and debris, which is visually disgusting at certain times but not dangerous to one's health.  In any case, the city of Paris decided that starting this summer, swimming will be authorised in the Bassin de la Villette as of July 15th as part of the annual "Paris Plages" event.  3 secure basins have been installed (photos coming up soon) where people will be able to frolic in the water free of charge.  One of them has a depth of 40cm for small children, the second one ranges from 1m to 1.20m and the third one is 2m deep.  Next year, if this is a success, they expect to install additional swimming places directly in the Seine, all of which is a buildup to the 2024 Olympic Games regarding which Paris expects to be awarded.  There will be swimming events in the Seine for the Olympics if the games occur here.

Anyway, this weekend, there were a number of official swimming races in the Canal de l'Ourcq and the Bassin de la Villette ("Open Swim Stars"), so I went to take a look yesterday.  It was a hot day.  There were no bikes at my bike station, so I took the bus to rue de Crimée where I found a number of groups waiting for shuttle buses to Pantin in the suburbs, where the day's races would begin.  These people were probably the ones without friends or partners to assist them, because there was a storage area for personal belongings at the arrival point.  The accompanied competitors did not require this service.

These people were waiting for the shuttle buses.

The buses quickly arrived, and they all piled in.

I decided that I was on the wrong side of the canal to see what I wanted to see, but just at the moment, the Pont de Crimée, the last pulley bridge in Paris went up.

This bird was outraged by the agitation.

I used the higher pedestrian bridge to cross over and got to the correct side in a jiffy.

This was the area for all of the official registration and other stuff.

[kerouac2]

It would take a while for the contestants to even reach Pantin, much less leave from there, so it was time to check out the activity in the area.

Here are the swimming basins for next month.  Since they are already here, I have no idea why they are making people wait to use them.

People were taking advantage of the weather and the refreshing water.

Is Paris a romantic city, even without love locks?

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I am starting to think that the small craft port is taking up too much room.  But I'm sure that it is a cash cow for the city.

I didn't want to wait around forever, so I chose to walk upstream in the direction of Pantin to see them sooner.  People can't always dip their feet into the water in the Canal de l'Ourcq

Plenty of street art in this part of the 19th arrondissement.

[amboseli]

Cool!
Must have been really good with such hot weather.

[bixaorellana]

This is great. Can't wait to see more!

[mich64]

Looks like a wonderful way to spend an afternoon! Seems to be well organized with plenty of volunteers to aid the participants.

[kerouac2]

I crossed the canal again on the old petite ceinture rail bridge.

Decorators have been at work.

People flowed into the Parc de la Villette, as they always do on warm sunny days.

The interesection of the Canal de l'Ourcq and the Canal Saint Denis is a popular hangout.

River police were posted regularly along the route the swimmers would be using.

The summertime floating bridge was still in place.  It swings out of the way for boats... and swimming races.

[kerouac2]

I continued up the canal. The swimmers couldn't be that far away now.



The suburb of Pantin starts just after the bridge. The big building is the huge old flour mill, now converted to elegant bank offices.

[kerouac2]

I could hear latino music coming from the Cabaret Sauvage in the back corner of the park. No time to check it out today.



Just for the record, this is how the park looked at 18:30. Most of the afternoon picnics were finished and the evening picnics had not yet started.







And here is the first swimmer, preceded by a guide.





There was a group in close pursuit.







Others were not so close, but they all seemed determined.

[kerouac2]

The Lafarge cement plant is one of the very last factories inside the Paris city limits. They had to allow a right of way for pedestrians after many years of splendid isolation.







Time for me to go home, but I admired some urban street art as I walked to the tramway line.







The tramway bridge offers and excellent view of the Grands Moulins de Pantin.



The water actually seems pretty nice out here.



These were starting to look like stragglers, but I could see others straggling all the way back to the horizon.





Okay, Ella Fitzgerald awaits me. That's the name of the tram station.



And here is a little bit of action.

[bixaorellana]

Fun and informative report on an amazing concept! I love all the "extras" besides the swimming part. The video really brings the event home.

Apologies if you answered this further up the page, but how long was the distance the swimmers were expected to cover? Were there people stationed along the edges to fish out anyone in trouble? Also, was this a competition, or more of a chance to let people see what they could do?

Dumb question, but how far down do the sides of the swim basins go, i.e., are they designed to keep people from heading out into the canal?

Again, must say how different and enjoyable this report is -- thanks!

Edited to say that I just saw what you said about the basins in the OP. (but how long is each one?)

[kerouac2]

I assume that the basins have either plastic floors or strong netting, not just to keep children (and others) from drowning but also to keep out the fish and also make it possible to retrieve lost items at the bottom. Now that they are making waterproof mobile phones, you know what that means.

[mossie]

Many thanks for this. So good to see the authorities making use of the Bassin and canal for public recreation.

Every visit I make to Paris I walk part of that, although I have never been as far as Pantin

[kerouac2]

This weekend the "Open Swim Stars" event took place, but this time it was moved to Pantin.  The reason for this is because Paris Plages started this weekend, so the Bassin de la Villette was completely occupied.  So they went out to the Canal de l'Ourcq which has become just as nice, and I was happy for a reason to return.

I am perfecty well aware of that location and knew exactly where to go.  Or that's what I thought until I decided to go there by bicycle this morning.  I was planning to to ride to the Ella Fitzgerald or Delphine Seyrig stations on the tram line and walk from there.  Unfortunately, when I got to Porte de la Villette, I had the brilliant idea of riding to the Pantin RER station right behind the Pantin town hall which faces the canal.  I rode out of Paris into Pantin and knew that all I had to do was to turn right relatively soon and I would be next to the canal.

Oh god, I can be so stupid sometimes.  I ended up in some awful industrial zone with cobbled streets, exactly what you don't want when you are on a bicycle.  I turned right, I turned left, I went straight ahead.  No sign of the canal or the mairie or anything else.  And then I was along a huge cemetery wall FOREVER.  I at least understood which cemetery it was -- "the Parisian cemetery of Pantin" -- Paris has a number of cemeteries extra muros because there is no way to keep all of the dead people in the city.  Well, Pantin is the biggest of the big because it is 107.6 hectares (tiny Père Lachaise in the city is only 43.93 hectares).  And of course the street along the side of it was cobbled, but at least I thought that if I ever got to the front of the cemetery, I would be back in civilisation.  Maybe there would even be a station where I could leave the bike and take a bus instead.  Any bus going anywhere.  I had already had enough biking.

Well, I turned the corner of the cemetery, passed the front gate where there was nothing and still had no idea where I was.  I was on a main road but it looked like it wasn't going anywhere that I wanted to be, so I turned right on some anonymous street.  I knew that if I turned right every time, at worst I would end up at my starting point.  Well, this street was totally crappy in some sort of sleazy industrial zone.  It was in bad condition and it seemed to keep getting worse.  But I had the impression that I was heading back in the direction of Paris, so that was a small consolation.

I kept going, and it was looking more and more like I was in the countryside instead of the city.  WTF?  A sign indicated that I was somewhere in Bobigny and therefore far from where I wanted to be.  My rural interlude took me back to a residential area, which was a relief of sorts.  There were train tracks so I tried to stay close to them (a sure sign of civilisation).  I reached a major intersection and there was actually a sign pointing to Pantin and Paris, but damn there was a big hill to get up over a lot of rail lines.  I actually had to get off the bike and walk to the top of the hill.  Then I continued and at one point I actually even passed over the canal.  Where had it been all this time?  On top of that, I was passing back over the canal, which means that I had crossed it at some other time without even seeing it.

Well, I finally made it back to a road that I recognised and quickly found myself at the Eglise de Pantin metro station, which was exactly the right place for the swimmers to go.  I managed to get rid of the bike, and there I was at last!

[kerouac2]

Actually, the big 5km event was yesterday. Today was more for amateurs -- just 1km followed by 2km. I like amateurs.



They came in all ages and different morphologies.

[kerouac2]

And off they go!









The final arrivals are absolutely dead and most of them have to be pulled up from the water.







I suppose there is a certain satisfaction in torturing themselves like this.

[kerouac2]

There were fewer people than at the Bassin de la Villette events. Covid or suburbs? Or maybe just the delay to mid July.







I walked to the far end of their circuit, because I knew exactly where to find the next metro station from a previous visit.



My camera zoomed in from afar to see the 2km departure.





The turnaround point was the big red buoy.



And then I was off to the metro because my legs still hurt from the bicycle ride (which was only 11km and 56 minutes according to the machine).

[htmb]

Oh, my goodness! You must be exhausted yourself!
I’m so glad you added to this thread. Somehow I’d missed the original posts.

[lagatta]

Thanks for that. Nice to see people enjoying themselves and keeping fit. More older people at the end of the line.

Sometimes when it is very hot, one gets exhausted cycling or jogging a very reasonable distance. It has been brutally hot and humid in Montréal. Hard to complain about as I loathe our winters, but I think it is record heat this summer.

[questa]

The second swimmer on the video has a great style...chops through the water and rolls a bit with his wave.
It seems funny to me to see all the guys with pale skin.I hadn't realised how Ozzie boys must grow up with summer after summer building up a permanent tan which only needs a "booster" dose of sun to brown up nicely.
Great pics, K2, Is the water moving i.e. were they swimming with or against any current?
Duly noted that not many people were following the social distancing rule.

[tod2]

Jul 20, 2020 0:37:23 GMT questa said:

Duly noted that not many people were following the social distancing rule.

Gosh I noticed that straight away! It's like Covid has left the building…..

[lugg]

I think this is great - wild water swimming is probably so much safer than in a pool at the moment. I love the photo of the little boy hugging his ( presume) Dad.

I really think we should make more use of our rivers / lakes etc